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Wednesday, 15 February 2017

INEC Without RECs IN 33 States, says Reps

House of Representatives Committee on
Electoral Matters and Political Party Affairs, during the budget presentation
session by the commission, Yakubu emphasised the urgency of finding
replacements for the RECs.

This came in affirmation when chairman of the
Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmud Yakubu, also disclosed that, by March 2017, five resident
electoral commissioners (RECs) would retire, bringing the total number of
states without RECs to 33.

On the planned expenditure of the
commission, he said N1.4 billion was to be used for the purchase of ballot
boxes for the conduct 2019 general elections, adding that INEC intended to
phase out the collapsible transparent ballot boxes and replace them with
plastic ones.

He expressed regret that despite the willingness of the committee
to patronize locally made products; local manufacturers have not displayed the
ability to deliver the required volume within the timeframe for elections.
Yakubu also said that the commission earmarked N500 million for the continuous
voter registration exercise across the country: “Sometimes, it is easier said
that we have manufacturers who have the capacity but when you engage them you
realise that we may not have such capacity for volumes and this is not only
peculiar to elections.

“Immediately you try to produce something locally,
somebody rushes to register a patent and claims ownership of that idea. Right
now, we have litigations of people who said the patent for smart card reader is
theirs,” he said.

“And they will get some favourable
judgement that we should pay them some fantastic amount. While it is important
for us to encourage our domestic producers, we are also careful about that
particularly because some of the procurement items are time bound.”

Chairperson of the committee,
Aishatu Dukku, stressed the need for transparency in the 2017 budget to reflect
the level of accountability within the commission:

“Election management bodies face
the formidable challenge of ensuring that stakeholders have trust in the
electoral process.

“The identification and adoption of
best practices in electoral framework and administration among nations have
resulted in placing countries under pressure to introduce electoral reform
measures.

“I am strongly advocating that this
electoral reform measures will form part of the budget of INEC.